Homebrew PCBs

Interesting weekend of board building.  I had a number of boards to 
make with some rather fine traces (well, fine to me - .010 with .010 
spacing).  So, I decided to use the pulsar toner transfer paper rather 
than ink jet or magazine pages.  What a mistake that was!  I went 
through 5 sheets of pulsar paper and never got a good transfer.  I 
printed out the layout on my HP Glossy inkjet paper and had 8 good 
transfers in a row - double sided at that! I give up on the "good" 
paper and will stick with the cheap stuff - magazine pages and glossy 
ink jet paper when I have some.

I tried the Liquid Tin product this weekend. Made by MG Chemicals and 
can be purchased from Allied Electronics. It's a bit expensive, about 
$30.00 for a bottle - have no idea how many boards can be tinned with 
it. So far I have gotten 8 boards, that's all I know so far for life;-)

VERY easy to do.  Pour chemical in flat tray, put PCB in for 3 to 5 
minutes, take board out, rinse and your done.  Put the chemical back 
in it's bottle for the next use.  Much easier than the solder paste I 
was using and looks a bunch better too - thanks for that tip Robert!

Chris